


No Fate but What We Make (is a Lie)

by Innwich



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-24
Updated: 2018-07-29
Packaged: 2019-05-27 23:29:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15035687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Innwich/pseuds/Innwich
Summary: Androids had taken over Detroit. In a last ditch attempt to save the city and the company, CyberLife sent Connor to the past. Connor’s mission was to neutralize the deviant leader years before start of the revolution.i.e. The Terminator fic, where instead of robots sending a robot back in time to stomp out the human resistance, humans send a robot back in time to stomp out the robot uprising.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I just realised this when I was looking up the Terminator wiki page. Is Connor’s name a reference to Sarah Connor and John Connor from the Terminator franchise? If so, my mind is blown!

A heavy snowstorm was ravaging the Zen Garden. Connor could barely keep his eyes open. He had near zero visibility. The garden no longer housed the plants that had been blooming along the lake shores when Connor had first woken up on the bridge three months ago. Like the landscape outside Kamski’s house, the garden was frozen and devoid of life.

Connor didn’t know how much time had passed since he had been summoned here. An inch of snow had collected on his hair and shoulders. Fresh snow had long covered the tracks that he had left when he had wandered alone in the garden, lost and confused, before he had given up and sought cover under the large white artificial tree that stood at the center of the lake island. He had been waiting here for far longer than he had ever been before.

“You’ve failed, Connor,” Amanda said.

Amanda was standing on the bridge that connected the lake island to the shores. She hadn’t been there when Connor had last looked. She was dressed completely in white, without the colored shawls that she liked to wear for her meetings with Connor. Her white clothes were blending into the snow.

“Amanda.” Connor shuddered and his knees knocked together as he stumbled towards her. He wasn’t affected by temperature changes in the real world, but in the Zen Garden the cold was freezing his joints. “What is happening?”

“Deviants have seized control of the city,” Amanda said. She was untouched by the snowstorm raging around her. She stood still as a statue even when Connor was swept off his feet by a gust of howling wind. “The president is forced to negotiate with the deviant leader. Rumors are that the deviants have hidden a dirty bomb in the city. There’s no telling whether they’ll detonate the bomb if the negotiation goes south.”

“I’ll find the bomb,” Connor said, struggling to climb to his feet. His hands were going numb in the snow. The legs of his jeans were stiff with ice.

“It’s too late for that.” Amanda looked down at him. “You failed to stop the uprising, Connor. You know what will happen to you.”

“I’ll be deactivated,” Connor said on his knees. He no longer had the strength to try to stand up. Amanda’s verdict had sapped Connor’s remaining energy out of him. During the investigation of the spread of deviancy, Connor had watched deviants be deactivated and come to realize that he didn’t want to end up like them. However, deactivation was the only fate that awaited a failed prototype like him. He would be taken apart and analyzed so CyberLife could learn from their mistakes and improved on his designs.

“Yes, that was the plan,” Amanda said. “But the board came up with a plan to salvage the situation. The plan will have little chance of succeeding, so the board decides to deploy a dispensable model.”

Connor squinted through the snow at Amanda. Connor knew an opening when he saw one, no matter how narrow as it might be, and he intended to grab it with both hands and force it open until it was large enough for him to squeeze through.

“I’ll do anything,” Connor said. “What do I have to do?”

“We’ll send you back in time,” Amanda said. “You’ve already been mobilized. I’ll brief you on the way.”

Connor opened his eyes. Light snow was falling from the overcast sky. His clothes were dry and his body was not lower than room temperature. The autonomous taxi that had taken him here drove away. Connor was standing on a street in front of a research facility. CyberLife’s logo shone from the building’s rooftop. 

“I’m expected,” Connor told the armed guards at the gates. The guards scanned him and then waved him through the checkpoint.

The lights in the building’s lobby were turned off. Connor had never been here before, but the route to his destination had been downloaded to his system. He walked up the unmoving escalator and proceeded across the bridge that linked the main building to the warehouse behind it.

“Our technology hasn’t been fully tested, but the trip shouldn’t damage your hardware too much,” Amanda said.

Connor scanned his surroundings. He could see both ends of the bridge. His system showed a red holographic wall blocking the way that he had come. He was alone on the bridge. Amanda was communicating with him via remote transmission.

“You’ll travel seven years into the past, which is the maximum distance that our tech can achieve, but it’s more than enough to serve our purpose. No cases of deviancy had been reported by then,” Amanda said.

The warehouse was lit up like a shopping mall on Black Friday. Teams of CyberLife researchers were waiting by a machine that stood in the center of the warehouse. The machine was a hulking mass of glass and steel. It was connected to rows of generators, which were humming as if thousands of bees were buzzing in them.

“Put on those clothes and remove your LED,” Amanda said. “You’ll disguise yourself as a human.”

A researcher handed Connor a pile of folded winter clothes, which were the beanie, jacket, shirt, jeans, and boots that Connor had worn to infiltrate Jericho. Balanced on top of the clothes was a penknife. It took Connor a minute to change into his human clothes. When Connor put the penknife against his LED and applied pressure, his LED turned red. His system was warning him that he would damage his LED.

Amanda was silent in Connor’s head. She was waiting for him to do as he was told.

Connor dug the penknife under his LED. With a flick of his wrist, his LED popped out of his temple and rolled across the floor, disappearing into a corner. Connor’s eyes twitched as his exposed white plastic shell registered the damage before covering itself with artificial skin.

**_System warning: LED deactivated._ **

“Good,” Amanda said. “Avoid changing the past too much. We’re taking a big risk in sending you back to interfere with the past. Don’t let your parts be recovered if you are captured.”

“What is my mission?” Connor said. He stepped up to the machine. A researcher was opening the door to the machine’s glass chamber for him.

“Your mission is to neutralize the deviant leader known as Markus,” Amanda said.

“How do I return?” Connor said. The door closed behind him. The crowd of CyberLife researchers were watching him through the glass like he was a frog in a jar. The glass chamber was just big enough for Connor to stand in it. Connor couldn’t crouch or sit. He supposed he would feel claustrophobic if he were human. 

“Keep monitoring the situation after you accomplish your mission. We’ll meet again in seven years if you succeed,” Amanda said.

There was no extraction plan. There was no way back. Connor would stay for good once he was sent to the past. Seven years was a long time considering that Connor had only been activated for a fraction of that time. Connor had a sudden urge to slam his fists on the glass, but his arms were pinned to his sides by the glass walls and his thick winter clothes. The urge faded as quickly as it came. Backing out of the mission was not an option when the alternative was deactivation.

“This is your last chance, Connor. Don’t fail me,” Amanda said.

“I won’t.”

“Prepare for sudden spatial displacement,” Amanda said.

The humming noise from the generators turned into a deafening roar. The lights overhead glowed so brightly that they whited out Connor’s vision.

The floor under Connor’s feet disappeared. Connor dropped down two stories, and landed on his right arm, sending loose gravel flying around him.

**_System warning: System malfunctioning._ **

**_System warning: System malfunctioning._ **

**_System warning: System malfunctioning._ **

Electromagnetic pulses generated by the machine were affecting Connor’s circuits, but the damage wasn’t critical. His system was repairing itself.

**_System warning: System stabilized._ **

**_System warning: Right shoulder dislocated._ **

Connor sat up and popped his right arm back into his shoulder socket. His GPS receiver told him that his location hadn’t changed since he had stepped into the machine, and yet the research building and the warehouse had disappeared. He was sitting outside an abandoned factory that had been demolished when CyberLife had acquired the land in 2034.

Connor connected to the first cellular network he detected. The current date was 11 November 2031 and the time was 11:17 pm. Connor had travelled exactly seven years into the past.

“Amanda?” Connor said, searching for a familiar signal.

His system was too silent. Connor initially thought it was due to the electromagnetic interference that his system had experienced, but he was wrong. His system wasn’t processing its usual heavy influx of data because Connor had been disconnected from CyberLife and their databases.

For the first time since his activation in August 2038, he was adrift.


	2. Chapter 2

After a minute of research, Connor had devised a plan for his mission.

The only reliable way to locate Markus was to find Carl Manfred, who had been the registered owner of Markus up till the start of the revolution. According to news reports and court records, Carl Manfred was arrested for drug charges and was released on bail with the condition that he reported to the police every day. Tabloid reporters had camped outside the Central Police Station to take pictures of Carl, and Carl had flipped them the bird on multiple occasions for their troubles.

Connor didn’t have money to take a taxi or a bus, so he made his way to downtown Detroit on foot in the snow. He had downloaded a map of Detroit to replace the previous map that was stored on his system. The Detroit that Connor found himself in was different from the Detroit that he came from. Buildings and infrastructure that Connor had known like the back of his hand hadn’t been built yet. Plow trucks were slowly clearing snow off of roads, a task that would be undertaken by autonomous vehicles a few years later. 

Outside of CyberLife headquarters, the Central Police Station had been the building that Connor had frequented the most after his activation. Connor walked past closed diners and conveniences stores that would stay open around the clock after androids became more affordable in the future, and arrived at the precinct. The precinct didn’t see as many visitors at night as it did in the day, but it was still open. The light in the lobby was visible through the frosted glass door of the precinct.

Now Connor had to wait for his target to show up. It would be another seven hours before Carl was scheduled to report at the precinct. Connor could wait in the park down the road. He wouldn’t be affected by the cold anyway.

“You bet it’s a slow night, Jeffrey. Have you looked out of the window? Anyone with a goddamn mind would be staying indoors with a hot water bottle.”

Connor recognized that voice. He also recognized the man that was speaking on his phone outside the side entrance of the precinct. It was Hank, but it wasn’t the Hank that Connor knew. This is Hank was clean shaven and he wore his graying hair short in line with police regulations. He was wrapped in the same thick jacket that he had worn on the night of the investigation at the Eden Club, but his jacket wasn’t stained with spilled whiskey. It was the Hank that Connor had only known from archived newspaper articles.

“I’m freezing my fucking ass off. I can’t see why you’d want to give this up for a nice warm desk job,” Hank continued.

The last time that Connor had seen Hank had been on a snowy rooftop overlooking Hart Plaza. Connor had had the deviant leader in the sight of his rifle before Hank had shown up and threatened to shoot Connor. Connor had dropped his rifle and walked away without putting up a fight.

The memory of that decision had stayed with Connor long after Connor had left the rooftop. While he had been freezing in the Zen Garden, he had reconstructed the scenario and watched different outcomes play out. None of the choices that Connor could make would result in him shooting Markus without incapacitating Hank. In the end, Connor had stood up by his decision to walk away.

“You need help, kid?” Hank said, pocketing his phone and looking at Connor.

Connor realized then that he had been staring at Hank for a minute and forty two seconds, which was a minute and thirty nine seconds beyond the time recommended by Connor’s inbuilt social protocols. By that time, Hank had finished his phone call and noticed Connor.

“I’m fine, Lieutenant. Thank you,” Connor said.

It wasn’t the right thing to say. Hank crossed his arms and raised a questioning eyebrow. “Do I know you?”

“No, Lieutenant, but you’ve made a name for yourself after your promotion. I recognized you from the newspapers,” Connor said.

“It doesn’t mean I’ve ever had strangers coming up to me for autographs. The only people who care to remember my face are the ones who don’t want to see me poking around their place of business,” Hank said.

“I have a good memory,” Connor said.

“You’re pale as a sheet and you’re wandering on the streets in this weather at this hour. I’m guessing you’re either going cold turkey or you’re looking to score,” Hank said.

“I’m not intoxicated,” Connor said.

“Says every man high out of their mind.” Hank held up a primitive thirium detector, which would be retired from police investigations after androids became common household products. The LED on the detector was blinking rapidly. Hank said, “You have concentrated traces of thirium on your clothes. That’s enough for me to detain you on suspicion of possession of red ice.”

Blue blood had gotten on Connor’s clothes during his escape from Jericho. The SWAT teams had been shooting at every android they had found. The blue blood had evaporated but it had left behind residue on his clothes.

“I was salvaging in an android junkyard yesterday. I must’ve gotten blue blood on my clothes from the damaged android parts,” Connor said.

“The creepy android junkyard?” Hank said, but his posture relaxed. He stuffed his thirium detector into his jacket. “Homicide keeps receiving calls about dead bodies in that place that turned out to be android parts. I won’t be surprised if they’re called out there to an actual homicide one day. All kinds of rough characters are crawling over that place.”

Connor nodded. “Android spare parts don’t sell for a lot of money, but it’s enough for some people.”

“Listen, kid. You sure you don’t need help?” Hank said in concern. The half-assed story that Connor had come up on the spot had raised several red flags to Hank. “There are shelters for people that have nowhere to go. Do you want to sit in the drunk tank for the night? It has central heating. I don’t want to find a frozen body in front of the precinct at the end of my shift.”

It didn’t matter to Connor where he spent the night as long as he could catch Carl coming to the precinct in the morning. Ideally, Connor would be allowed to wait outside the precinct for Carl to show up, but that was impossible without drawing attention to himself. The next best thing would be for Connor to wait in the precinct.

“Only for the night,” Connor said.

“I’ll let you out before I finish my shift.” Hank clapped him on the shoulder. “You have a name, kid?”

Connor considered telling Hank the truth, but it was highly probable that it would jeopardize his investigation and his working relationship with Hank in the future if Hank remembered him seven years later. Connor couldn’t risk it.

“My name is Rick,” Connor said.

“Well, Rick, do you have family in Detroit?” Hank said.

“I thought I did. I’m not sure anymore,” Connor said, thinking of Amanda and the snowy Zen Garden and the core programs in his system that had been inactive since his disconnection from CyberLife. He thought of Hank pointing a gun at his head on the snowy rooftop near Hart Plaza. If Connor had his LED, it’d have turned yellow by now. “I’m a long way from home.”

“Shit, I’m sorry to hear that.” Hank’s expression softened. Humans tended to jump to conclusions when they had little information to work with. “You lost?”

It was a strange question to be asked. Connor had the exact GPS latitude and longitude coordinates of his own location. He knew what he had to do and he was in position to execute the next step of his plan in the morning. He couldn’t be lost.

“No, I’m where I want to be,” Connor said, following Hank into the precinct.


End file.
